feel free to browse http://boards.cannabis.com/forumdisplay.php?f=325 for Grow FAQ's you might find them helpful for beginning, and if you can try to find some books and read, when I was ready to make the first step and plant the seed, or even think of cloning I read as much as I could read about the basics and essentials....more advance techniques came after me and my friend did our first successful grow, kinda crash course, did 3 seeds got females...after that I was comfortable and learned from my mistakes...best of luck on finding the info you need im gonna have to agree with using hps but im sure for 9 plants now 4 will be fine but your gonna need atleast twice as many when they grow up, and then when you flower for quality your definately gonna want the hps....Enjoy!